Helmut Marko admitted Red Bull have been “thinking about setting the second car up differently”, in order to make it “easier to handle.”

Yuki Tsunoda will be making his Red Bull debut at his home race at Suzuka this weekend, after a short two-race stint for Liam Lawson, who heads back to Racing Bulls.

Marko: Red Bull thinking about ‘less aggressive’ car set-up on second RB21

With team leader Max Verstappen preferring a car with a highly-sensitive front end, his team-mates have sometimes struggled to extract the most from the car in the same way, given just how much the Red Bull has seemed to respond to its inputs – though it has often resulted in higher overall performance.

Marko agreed that former Red Bull driver Alex Albon’s view of the car being like a “computer mouse” in terms of how high its sensitivity is represents an “accurate description”, and the team may look to rectify that, though nothing is yet confirmed.

He told Motorsport.com: “We’ve already been thinking about setting up the second car differently — with a less aggressive set-up. Something that makes it easier to handle.”

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Away from setting the car up, Marko confirmed Red Bull are looking at upgrades to try and make the RB21 “much more stable” across all conditions.

While the team looked to make a car for optimum performance, their senior advisor hopes to see updates that remove the “negative tendencies” introduced on last year’s RB20 which lingered in pre-season testing in Bahrain.

He acknowledged the upgrades may not be immediate, but work is already ongoing back at Milton Keynes.

“There was a meeting with the lead engineers and Max, where all these issues were openly laid out, along with the solutions we have planned,” Marko explained.

“Updates, of course, can work — or they might not. That happens at Mercedes, it happens at Ferrari.

“We’re chasing something much more stable — a car that works on all tracks, at all temperatures, and with all tyre compounds. That’s the direction we’re headed in, and I’m confident we’ll get there.

“Things have already been set in motion. We already saw in the Bahrain test that certain negative tendencies from last year’s car had reappeared. And developments like this don’t happen overnight.

“But within a foreseeable timeframe, those parts should make it onto the car.”

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